Up and Running...

...finally! I had a three mile run this morning and so far everything seems to be staying together. I'm a little sore, but not in a bad way.

This past week I've been road biking, and have come to the conclusion that road biking is very, very, very boring. I should have never gotten on my mountain bike. Who knew it was going to spoil the whole road biking trip for me? But I find it very hard to stay engaged on my road bike when I'm going down a path pedaling, pedaling, pedaling and the only remotely interesting thing that happens is a squirrel races across the road. When I'm on my mountain bike the whole world is one big thing to jump on, or over. There are curbs to hop, stairs to go down, mountains to climb, switchbacks to conquer! The only challenge my road bike offers is avoiding suicidal wildlife. The Cinderella Metric Century is in March and I'm not sure how I'm going to manage 63 miles. It's not my fitness level I'm worried about. I doubt my legs are going to seize up and fall off. My brain cells however are probably in danger of major bonking.

And speaking of bunnyhops, I tried to watch a video on mountain biking technique. I wonder why the producers thought watching a 16 year old boy bunnyhop over a picnic table was going to help *me* with my bunnyhopping technique. I wonder how many picnic tables I'm going to need to clear when I'm out riding. Is there some "picnic-table-in-the-middle-of-the-trail" syndrome that I need to know about? Rocks and tree limbs yes, but if a picnic table suddenly looms out from the middle of the forest trail I'm just going to assume I went off track a ways back and I'll just go around it. Anyway, the riding on the DVD was entertaining, but the "how to" commentary was useless. "Umm...I'm Johnny Jumpover, a 12 year old mountain biker with a better bike than you and, uh, I'm here to tell you how to ,um, bunny hop? Cause it's really useful to do that? So yeah. So, you grab the handlebars? And uh, then push down with the legs? And, um, just kinda go over the log, and uhh, bring your back wheel up. Um. And that's how you do it."

For those of you who need translation what Johnny really said is "I'm a bmx boy who has spent way to much time "endo"ing over my handlebars without my helmet and I have no clue as to how to explain what a bunnyhop is, so instead I'll show you footage of me jumping over a picnic table."

Ride on friends, where ever your bike takes you, but be wary of suicidal squirrels and picnic tables!